


oh, winter (won't you melt to spring?)

by izukillme



Series: Avatar WLW Week 2020 [3]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Angst, Avatar WLW Week 2020, Azutara if you squint, Crazy Azula (Avatar), F/F, Hurt No Comfort, I hate that word so much omg, Insanity, Madness, No Azula Redemption, azula is Not Okay, it's really more 'Azula' than Azutara
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:21:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26304061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/izukillme/pseuds/izukillme
Summary: The people in Azula’s life change as the seasons do.
Relationships: Azula/Katara (Avatar)
Series: Avatar WLW Week 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1902349
Comments: 33
Kudos: 79





	oh, winter (won't you melt to spring?)

**Author's Note:**

> I present Azula as somewhat sympathetic in this, but she isn't. She has done terrible things and needs to atone for them before she can ever reconcile with the people she hurt. She needs to heal too, though. Also it's really only Azutara if you squint, sorry, and all one-sided.

The people in Azula’s life change as the seasons do. They come in a flurry of spring blossoms and leave when the first snow falls. Always, they are gone before she can make them bleed and call it love. They disappear because of their ~~dedication to someone else over~~ fear of her.

The Waterbender girl doesn’t do that. She is quick to anger and slow to forgive, but she’s the first to support Azula and stop her from falling. The first to heal even minor cuts and bruises. She does it with hatred in her eyes, but maybe that hatred is what keeps her around. Azula didn’t think there was a stronger emotion to glue people to her side than fear, but apparently there is. It’s not nice to be proven wrong, but a small consolation is that no one else has to _see_ her be wrong.

_Hatred will keep them with you. Even if to hurt, mock, taunt and jeer. So make them hate you._

Katara, Azula learns her name over the next few months. She uses it to tease and to bait—because she’ll take anything over cold silence—but Katara just clenches her ugly (beautiful) brown hands and continues to heal the wounds Azula creates on herself from her temper tantrums every day. Azula knows Katara only comes down here because her _perfect_ brother Zuzu begged, but the water takes away the pain just a bit, and makes the fog of her mind a little clearer.

“Why?” The single word contains so much bitterness, so much fury, that even Azula is taken aback by it. She knows exactly what Katara is asking her, the million questions hidden by the single word. It could mean ‘why do you do this to yourself’, but that would mean Katara _cares_ and Azula knows she doesn’t.

(She can’t possibly expect her to.)

“I don’t know.” Azula says hollowly, and finds that it’s a little bit of a lie and a lot of the truth. She’s had time to think about everything she’s done, and in the end this is her answer. There isn’t really a reason. Power? Too fleeting. Her father’s love? The only thing no one could ever earn, because Ozai never knew how to love anyone, not even himself. 

In the end, fire consumes all. That’s the only reason she can think of. Everything will eventually fall to the purity of heat and light, and Azula likes purity very much. 

“I wasn’t asking for an answer,” Katara snaps, yanking her healing water away from the gash on Azula’s leg. “I know why you did it. You wanted to rule the world.”

“No,” Azula says before she can stop herself, “I did it because fire is meant to burn, and it would’ve spread eventually. Better to get over with what is inevitable, don’t you think?”

Katara stares at her like she’s insane. Then she shakes her head incredulously, the brown hair bouncing, and leaves as if she had never come. She doesn’t return after that. 

Azula pretends that she doesn’t wait up for Katara every night, pretends that she is comfortable with an asylum physician patching up her wounds. Azula pretends because she’s good at pretending. It’s all she’s ever done anyway.

(She pretends that it doesn’t hurt all different, like her very soul has been ripped out.)

Huddling in the corner of her bed one night, she tries to ignore her mother’s voice whispering in her head. But it’s so loud, it drowns everything else out, and soon Azula’s struggling to breathe past the honey-coated poison she’s being fed.

 _I left because of you, Azula. Zuko left because of you. Father left because of you. Mai and Ty Lee, because of you. Even Katara left… because of you. You perfect little_ **_monster._ **

Azula curls further into herself, trying to escape. But one singular thought, risen from the depths of her mind, lifts its head against the storming sea of confusion. The lightning she loved once paints it stark white and burns it into the backs of her eyes.

 _I wish_ **_I_ ** _could leave myself too._

**Author's Note:**

> comments make a blob happy~


End file.
